What is the difference between a regular string and a verbatim string?

Question

I have a trial version of Resharper and it always suggests that I switch regular strings to verbatim strings. What is the difference?

Answer 1

There is no runtime difference between a string and verbatim string. They're only different at compile time. The compiler accepts fewer escape sequences in a verbatim string so what-you-see-is-what-you-get other than a quote escape.

You can also use the verbatim character, @, to tell the compiler to treat a keyword as a name:

var @if = "if";
//okay, treated as a name
Console.WriteLine(@if);
//compiler err, if without @ is a keyword
Console.WriteLine(if);

var @a = "a";
//okay
Console.WriteLine(@a);
//also okay, @ isn't part of the name
Console.WriteLine(a);